The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1887-11-16
Compliments are Dangerous.

Are not our friends idiosyncracies
merely their good points which have
been aired too much, and does not the
giving of compliments tend to harden
their individuality into popularity?
For example, l know a man who has
been told so often that if he had writ
ten he would have written like Charles
Dudley Warner that when he pens a
letter he wanders up to and around his
subject in what he fancies is the easy
style of that delightful writer, but
which seems to his correspondent like
loafng over his ideas Then there is a
newcomer in literature who, having
been told that she used adiectives
with discrimination, feels called upon
to talk about "dark, dusky, sable
forest" because in her own mind she
sees difference between three differ
ent shades of backness. Without
doubt the girl who sits opposite me at
the table has been told that she eats
daintily, for the habit of quirking her lit
tie finger grows ON her with every meal.
a certain young lady who lives over
the way was informed she was more
charming than regular beauty be-
cause her face lighted up more readily.
She at once made specially of looking
animated, and soon her features in
company took ON contortions instead
of vivacity. A worthy lady of my
acquaintance frequently heard it said
that her mission was to heal the
broken-hearted. Now her zeal leads
her to hunt continually for a wound,
and she never finds it without medding
with the wounded ones business. But
can we dispense with the compliment
when we all know what an eX-
hilarating effect it has on the nerv-
Gus system? What matters it that
Helen was beautiful and Hypatia wise
if you, you are pleasing to your friend
because your hair has golden lights
in the sun? Hearing which hattering
fact, you resolve to sit in that chair in
the sunshine every afternoon about four,
when callers are likely to come. Well,
if we cannot give up the compliment
as a tonic can we not administer 1t
Geographically, as it were, in high
dilution of criticism on a third party?
Who was it said, "Our ueighbors' per-
sonal defects strike us in the light
Ol COUl DlllHtulS W OutStlNcS' iiCiC'
then, may be a left-handed way of
noticing our friends charms less hurt
full than the direct method in its effects
on the charms themselves. If you tell
Mrs. A that Mrs. b squinnies up her
eyes when she laughs Mrs. a feels
pretty sure that you think her lady
quite capable of telling when her own
eyes begin to squinny. Yet your words
remind her to be little careful to guard
against the habit. If, being a man,
your wife asks you if you have noticed
how round-shouldered Mr.. Brown is
growing it is to be presumed that she
thinks your own shoulders straight
enough for you to make them a stand
ard of comparison. Yet you begin to
wonder to yourself if you have yielded
to that tendency to stoop going up hill.
But this roundabout way of praising
has one serious objection. 1t has a
bad reaction on the praiser and leads
him to gather in heavy crop of hate
full remarks for the sake of sitting out
little light approval. On the other
hand, the giving of direct, sincere
compliment certainly blesseth him that
gives if not him that takes. The ques-
ton then is, Shall we risk spelling Mrs.
A by complimenting her, or risk spoil
ing ourselves by criticising Mrs. Is?
What do you think about it?-Gract
Blanchard, IN Homestead.